GIRLS BASKETBALL: Minster advances to title game of Mauk Invitational

ELIDA — The Minster girls basketball team glided through the first eight minutes of Wednesday’s game.

Their transition game created easy baskets. Their defense got stops.

An advancement to Thursday night’s title game of the Vicki Mauk Holiday Invitational seemed wrapped, bow on top.

Instead in a game where leads were never safe, Minster required a fourth-quarter surge to escape with a win.

Minster had to work harder for it than those first eight minutes promised, but the Wildcats moved on to the title game of the Vicki Mauk Invitational with a 54-49 win over Miller City at the Elida Fieldhouse on Wednesday night.

Elida drubbed Toledo Woodward, 77-23, in the second game.

Minster blew leads of 13 points in the first half and then let a 10-point lead slip away in the second half before it finally wrested control away from the feisty Miller City squad with 10 straight points to start the fourth quarter.

Minster head coach Nann Stechschulte ruminated on her team’s inability to close out Miller City.

“It’s almost like we pace ourselves,” Stechschulte said. “We need to play 110 percent all the time.”